I speak with doctors everyday who are concerned about the health of their practices. Sickeningly low reimbursement, increasing overhead costs, staff turnover, and heightened pressure on physicians to do more for less make every passing year feel a little more difficult to get ahead.

Although it may seem this way, I want to make something clear. It is still possible to succeed in private practice and to run efficiently and productively while creating the work/life balance that you desire.

How? By paying attention to what is really happening in your practice (scheduling and how it affects patient flow, customer/patient satisfaction, quality of care, maximization of visits (following treatment protocols), maintaining a healthy influx of new patients through smart marketing, staying compliant with everything (outsourcing where you can), and being painfully aware of your billing and receivables situation (incorporating more and more cash and not being afraid to pull the plug on certain payer contracts). Most of all though, your success depends on staying accountable (or having someone like me be the birdie on your shoulder) and ONLY comparing YOU/Your practice to YOU/Your practice.

Please stop listening to your “colleagues” who practice in other areas of the country with completely different payers, patient demographics, overhead costs and personal life situations and feeling bad about yourself (and your practice).

Each month look at metrics that compare the previous month as well as the previous year (same month) with repeated parameters. In the PPA library there is a robust list of “suggested monthly reports” if you don’t know where to begin.

Here’s an example from one of my long time practices (solo practitioner) who decided two years ago that he wanted a 4-day work week and a little more “me time.” He buckled down, staffed up (for the 4 clinic days), decided to do less surgery, and became even more regimented with metric analysis. Here were the results: 

Overall collections in 2024 were $3,186 less than in 2023 with an average daily collection of  $7007 (versus $6909 in 2023) and 4 less days worked (that’s an extra week off for the doctor and staff), we considered 2024 a win! I hope you will agree!